The amount of state funding for farmland preservation reached a high of about $102 million in 2006, in part because of a bond issue, said Doug Wolfgang, director of the state’s Bureau of Farmland Preservation.

Funds decreased in the following years, to as low as $20 million for 2010. For 2013, the state threshold is $33 million.

“It’s the most significant amount the state board has been able to set since 2008,” Wolfgang said.

The state’s conservation easment purchase program is celebrating its 25th anniversary. Officials said in February that, since the program began in 1988, state, county and local governments have invested nearly $1.2 billion to preserve 471,601 acres on 4,385 farms in 57 counties for future agricultural production.